


Only When You Lose It

by CrazyBucket



Category: Marvel Cinematic Universe, The Avengers (Marvel Movies), The Avengers (Marvel) - All Media Types
Genre: F/F, Martasha, blackhill - Freeform, but not really, things are complicated
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2016-09-07
Updated: 2016-09-25
Packaged: 2018-08-13 12:46:51
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 2
Words: 5,856
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/7977271
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/CrazyBucket/pseuds/CrazyBucket
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Or the one Maria is playing catching up with her feelings whilst the world is pretty much ending every single time.</p>
<p>It follows the movies, adding pieces in between but is completely focused on her relatioship with Natasha, because that's all that matters really *insert laugh preending not to mean what I just wrote even though I totally mean it*</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Avengers & Winter Soldier

**Author's Note:**

> So, at first this was an idea for an one shot, but it kinda grew and I figured it would be better to separate this from my compilation of one shots based on tropes.
> 
> To me this feels incredibly slow burn, but I could be wrong and it's just me overreacting and/or being controlled by feelings of anxiety :)
> 
> The whole thing is supposed to show them from a little before the first Avengers movie until a bit after Civil War, but this may change.
> 
> There are like 78305757483939 billion spoilers from the movies, so beaware :)
> 
> And I hope you enjoy!

“Maria, what are we?”

They just had sex. It was as great as usual and Maria honestly could use a nap, but once again Natasha was questioning where they stand. It was complicated given that Natasha was her subordinate and both of them had an upbringing that made relationships hard, to say the least. Frankly Maria wanted things to stay just as they were, a sort of friends with benefits without really being friends. The attraction was undeniable, but she just couldn’t draw a scenario where the two of them could be anymore than that. This wasn’t about feelings, it was about facing reality.

The brunette realizes she’s been staring speechless for awhile, and upon looking the hopeful look Natasha was giving her a frustrated sigh escaped. Why can’t things just be the way they are?

“Natasha, we talked about this…”

“We did, yeah. But can you really say that a year and a half after we started to sleep together nothing changed? Nothing changed about how you feel?”

“I remember you were quite happy with this arrangement.”

“Key word being ‘was’ “.

“Nat, you know we can’t go further than this…”

“Why not?”

“For Christ’s sake, Natasha, I’m your boss!” Her demeanor changed. She didn’t want to have this discussion, but it didn’t look like she had much of a choice.

“I’m not asking you to parade me around announcing our engagement, Maria. All I’m saying is it would be nice to tell my friends why I’m not interested in dating other people.”

“Natasha, all your friends work at SHIELD. Can’t you see how stupid that would be?”

“It’s not like Clint would rat you out, you know that. And you may be a superior officer, but you don’t belong in my direct line of command, so I’m sure it would be…”

“Enough, Nat! That’s not going to happen.” Maria’s tone was authoritative. She gets up, trying to put some space between them. “There’s too much at stake.You are just being naive”

There’s a rather long and uncomfortable silence.

“Ok, I get it.” Natasha gets up and collects her clothes. “You’ve made your decision. Unfortunately I can’t abide by your rules anymore, Assistant Director Hill.” She puts her clothes on. “I’ll let myself out.” And she leaves.

As soon as Natasha leaves it downs to Maria that she could have handled the situation a lot better. Natasha was being childish, that’s for granted, but there was no need to be so rispid to the only person Maria has ever maintained a (sort of) relationship for over a month. To her, the reasons they couldn’t be in a relationship were crystal clear. It’s not like she didn’t care about the redhead, but she had obligations, rules to follow. There was no space for exceptions, no matter the cost. In a way, it surprised Maria how someone with Natasha’s past could be so willing to trust and develop relationships with other people. Maria’s past was no fairytale, but it didn’t come near to what the redhead has been through, and yet somehow she was the one avoiding personal contact the most.

The next following days Natasha does her damn best to avoid being in the same room as Maria, and the brunette doesn’t push it. It was probably better to end things like this, so maybe Natasha could find someone to provide her what she needed. Maria for sure wasn’t that person, or so she thought. Notwithstanding, Maria was starting to miss the other woman’s presence. It was almost like the days were a bit colorless, as if she was anxious for something to happen that she didn’t even know what it was.

Not long after Loki appears and steals the Tesseract. Maria barely manages to get out of the SHIELD facility in one piece, but it somehow happened. At the Hellicarrier, Natasha continues to give her the silence treatment, acting as if she wasn’t even there. Perhaps the spy harbored more feelings regarding their “thing” than anticipated. Or maybe she was too distracted by the new visitors to pay any attention to the commander. All Maria knew was that suddenly she was craving the spy’s attention like she never craved anyone’s attention her whole life. She did her best to play it cool, using her trademark ice queen/ bitch resting face at pretty much all times.

During the alien invasion, the brunette watches the Avengers fight through almost every surface at the Hellicarrier, and despite being a bit worried about Natasha, she knows the woman can handle herself.

That is until the government decides to nuke the city, and all Maria can think about is Nat and how she can not die. In her thoughts, the sentence comes almost as a mantra “Please not her, please not her” and when Stark manages to take the missile out, the weight lifted off her shoulders is overwhelming. And it hits her that the woman holding the scepter and closing the portal likely means more to her than a simple co-worker with benefits.

At the end, Maria survives the attack with a few minor injuries, but after the emotional rollercoaster the day provided - Coulson dying, aliens, almost blowing up the east coast, Natasha kicking ass - she never felt more drained. Despite her body’s pleas for a warm bed and a huge pizza, she finds herself knocking on Natasha’s door.

“Hey”

Natasha answers wearing a robe, hair dripping wet.

“What are you doing here?”

“Humm… can we talk?”

“Hill, I had one hell of a day today…”

“Yeah, of course. You are right.” Maria begins to feel awkward. This was the worst idea ever. “I’ll call you tomorrow?!”

“Sure” She says nonchalantly, as she turns and shuts the door.

When Maria calls her the next day it goes straight to voicemail. She tries a few other times during the week, without luck. Odds were, she was been avoided. Maybe this was for the best. Luckily for her, her job was a great distraction and she still had to coordinate teams to collect all the alien rubbish around New York. Not exactly exciting, but it took her mind off the confusion she was feeling inside.

The next time Maria sees Natasha the spy she looks different, lighter. It is the same gorgeous face she had seen before but it’s almost like she has a different glow. Maria’s first instinct was to run to her and talk. She didn’t want to say anything in particular, she honestly just wanted to hear Natasha’s voice, maybe hear how her day has been. But being the professional she is she just shrugs it off, blaming her incoherent feelings to the need to get laid. She told herself that all this reactions to Romanoff were simply because their “let’s do it” routine had been canceled, and the fact they had had sex pretty much everywhere in that Hellicarrier did not help. They were landing in a few hours and as soon as that happens Maria decided she would go back to her old days of one stands and absolutely no strings attached and everything would be fine again.

A couple of hours later Maria is sitting in a bar, nursing a whisky. She never had a problem picking up women before but tonight she was a bit off. Even without her usual mojo a blonde approaches her and Maria takes her to her place. That was pretty much everything Maria remembered about that night, but waking up with the said blonde by her side tells her that she couldn’t be that far off of what happened.

“Good morning.” The blonde tells her.

“Morning.”

“I’ll be out in a few minutes, I promise.”

“Ok.”

After the woman gets dressed and is ready to leave she turns to Maria.

“Look, I know this is a one night stand and nothing more and I’m very comfortable with that. But given that I’m in desperate need of coffee and by the look in your face so are you, care to join me for a crappy breakfast at the nearest joint?”

“I heard right about until you said coffee. I’ll get dressed.”

During ‘breakfast’ Maria learned that the woman’s name was Kate, she was a lawyer and liked to add what seemed like five hundred spoons of sugar to her coffee.

“You know, I wasn’t completely honest with you before.” Kate tells her and Maria raises her eyebrows. “I wanted to tell you something, that’s why I invited you to join me.”

“What do you want to tell me?”

“First, I want to tell you I’m not judging you or anything and as far as one night stands go last night was great but… call her.”

“What?”

“You should call Natasha.”

“How do you know about her?”

“Well, you called me Nat and many variations of that name last night.”

“Oh... I’m sorry, I…” Maria was mortified. What sort of rookie and inconsiderate mistake was this?

“No, it’s ok. I’ve been there, believe me. But I really think you should call her. I don’t know what happened of what you told yourself should happen but you obviously like this chick. Don’t blow that.”

“It’s complicated.”

“It always is. But doing nothing won’t make it any easier.”

Maria nods and takes a sip of her coffee. They talk for a few more minutes and then say their goodbyes.

Just as Maria enters her NYC office, she gets a call from Fury telling her to go to D.C. immediately and as a good soldier that’s exactly what she does.

When Maria gets there she finds out everything has gone to shit. Everything SHIELD stood for was a lie and there were more Hydra agents infiltrated than the number of times Stark has been referred to as narcissistic. Fury wanted to fake his own death to throw the enemy off and needed her help. Only later she discovered that the plan included lying to everyone they once knew and trusted, although it did make sense since they didn’t know exactly who was Hydra and who wasn’t, the thought they could not trust Natasha or even Captain Freaking America bothered her more than she let on.

At the hospital whilst playing her part, Maria couldn’t help but feel heartbroken. She knew Fury was going to be fine, but seeing Natasha in such distress and not being able to do something about it was devastating. Deep down she knew there was no way Natasha was Hydra, but she couldn’t jeopardize Fury’s plan. When Maria saw Nat near Fury’s alleged dead body, the tears just escaped her. She didn’t know for certain if it was because of the scene itself, because Nat was hurting or simply because after all they’ve been through she was finally able to see Nat without all her walls up and she couldn’t even get near her. She desperately wanted to hold the shorter woman in her arms and tell her that it was all fake and everything would be alright, but given the impossibility of such gestures at the time she just stood there, a few feet away, crying.

The upside in all of this was seeing Nat had apparently found a friend in Rogers, even if she still wasn’t aware of it. It was clear that the captain cared about her, and knowing she had a friend (or maybe something more?) to comfort her after Clint’s half ass retirement and everything that was happening was somehow soothing to Maria.

In the car, after taking that scruciating helmet off, Maria tells herself that Nat’s complete and utter indifference was because of the GSW to her shoulder, which is understandable, but the fact that Nat is wearing a jacket that belonged to Maria didn’t go unnoticed. Maria trades places with the new guy Sam, and applies pressure to Natasha’s wound until they reach the dam. At this point, Maria, knowingly or not, would take any chance to be closer to the spy, and being the only one with some knowledge of first aid (besides Natasha), she took advantage of that.

They arrive and Maria makes sure Nat sees Fury before anything else. The relief showed in the redhead’s face was enough to make Maria smile. At last a little bit of hope. Subsequently, everyone helped to develop a plan to stop Hydra and when all details are settled everyone goes to rest.

But once again Maria goes against what her body is telling her to do, as she knocks at Natasha’s door.

“Yes?” Natasha asks, still wearing the same clothes from before.

“Can I come in?”

She doesn’t answer, but turns around leaving the door open, so you get in.

“Considering we might all die tomorrow, I thought maybe we could have that talk?” 

Maria said those words meaning lighten the mood, but it was a terrible attempt really. Implying their imminent demise to break the ice. Maria makes a mental note to work on her joking skills at a later time.

“What do you want to say?” She sits on her bed.

And as destiny would have it, Maria is at a loss of words. She had months to think this through and now that the opportunity was right in front of her, her brain decides to act like an anxious 13 year old. She starts to rationalize everything, but when your eyes find hers her feelings get the best of her and she just blurts out:

“I miss you”

It comes out silently, almost as a whisper. In response, Natasha lets out a small laugh.

“No you don’t”

“I really do, Nat. I miss you, I l...”

“No, Maria. You may miss a toy you no longer are allowed to play with, but you are not missing me.” The redhead said matter of factly.

“How can you say that?”

“How could I not? We fuck for over a year and I can barely get you to look at me with anything but lust and the second I decide being your fuckbuddy isn’t gonna cut it you all of a sudden have feelings for me? This is ridiculous. You miss the power, you miss having someone to use and throw away. You miss not having someone ready to go when you feel like it, but you definitely don’t miss me.” She grabs a folder. “Great talk. Now, if you’d excuse me, I have a mission to prepare for.”

And on that note, Maria leaves, astonished. Wanting some air, she goes outside and finds Steve near the entrance.

“Worried about tomorrow?” Maria asks.

“Not really. Knowing who the enemy is makes things a lot easier.”

“Worried about Bucky then?”

“He didn’t even remembered me. That’s how much he was brainwashed. I need to get him back, reverse this thing.”

“If it is reversible we will find a way, Captain.”

“I hope so. And since we are going on a suicide mission together, we might as well skip formalities. It’s Steve.”

Maria nods.

“It will be difficult, but I believe we have a fair chance and we got the best of SHIELD on our side so, I sort of pity them.”

“Too bad Natasha is out of commission. I’m pretty sure considering the amount of anger she’s been caring she could single handedly kill everyone that crosses our path.”

“Especially me” Maria laughs.

A few seconds pass, both in silence.

“So, you are the one?”

“The one?”

“The one who got her upset. It does explain why she was giving you those looks earlier.”

“Yep. And believe it or not I just made everything worse a few minutes ago.”

“She likes you, Maria. Otherwise there would be no reason to react to you like that.”

“I don’t think that’s the case, but I appreciate the sentiment.”

“What about you?”

“You mean if I have feelings for her?” He nods. “Yes. It’s driving me insane, but yes. But I guess I found it out too late.”

“As the world’s leading authority in waiting, I don’t think that’s the case, but if you’ve already given up there’s nothing to say, really.”

“You are surprisingly liberal to an old guy.” They laugh. “I could kill for a cigarette right now.”

Steve hands her a pack of cigarettes, with a lighter inside.

“Captain America is a smoker?”

“Not really. I got it from Sam. He’s trying to quit but I found his stash.”

“Well, thank you Sam.”

She lights up a cigarette, and they hang out a while longer.

The next day, whilst preparing everything Maria hears a knock on her door, only to find a puppy eyed redhead looking back at her. Natasha was already dressed like her cover, but wasn’t wearing the mask.

“Hey.”

“Hey.”

“Look, about yesterday… I guess I overreacted a bit.”

“It’s OK.”

“I still mean everything I said, I just should’ve put it differently I guess.”

“I see. You suck at apologies by the way.” Maria smiles.

“I don’t know what you are talking about.” Natasha also smiles. “Are you ready?”

“Basically, yes.” Maria grabs her gun and puts it on its holster. “Let’s go?”

“Yeah.”

But instead of getting out Natasha closes the partially opened door, moves slowly but surely towards Maria and presses her lips against the taller woman’s ones.The kiss is pretty chaste, and before Maria gets the chance to grab the spy’s head to deepen the kiss Natasha had already pulled away.

“I’m sorry, I shouldn't have done that. This was a mistake… I’ll go get my things. Ahmm.. Good luck today, Hill.”

Even considering the awkward ending, the kiss gave Maria more hope about a possible future with Natasha then she ever felt before their breakup. Because now maybe, just maybe Natasha still liked her, and Maria definitely wanted to entertain and explore that possibility.


	2. Winter Soldier & Age of Ultron

After their stunt at the Triskelion, Maria doesn’t even consider debriefing and goes straight home. Who would she debrief anyway? There was no more SHIELD, and she couldn’t even think about the implications of that. At home, she pours herself some whisky and turns the TV on. She browses channels for a few minutes, until there’s a knock on her door.

Finding the circumstances suspicious, she takes her gun and proceeds with caution, but the voice she hears is pretty much one of the last ones she could imagine knocking at her door this late at night.

“Maria, it’s me, Nat.”

She leaves her gun on a side table and opens the door.

“Nat? Is everything alright?”

“Yeah, I just wanted to see you.”

“Me? Why?”

“Well, you were inside a building that collapsed.”

Maria lets out a small laugh. “Yeah, I almost forgot about that.”

Natasha’s hand finds its way to Maria’s cheek. “Are you really ok?”

“Yeah. I was terrified of possibly killing Captain America, but now that we found him I’m ok.”

“I can only imagine”

“What about you? How’s your shoulder?”

“I’m fine. Had much worse.”

“Wanna come in and…” Before Maria could finish her sentence, Natasha’s lips were on hers. Natasha kisses her with such urgency it takes Maria a few seconds to find the rhythm. Natasha’s right hand starts to mess with Maria’s hair, pulling her face closer, and the other is underneath Maria’s shirt caressing her back. Maria takes advantage of her position and scoops Nat up, who gets the message and places her legs around the brunette’s waist and soon after the redhead is pinned against the wall. They make out frantically, as if this was their last chance at it. 

“Take me to bed.” The spy purrs on Maria’s ear, between nibbles.

And Maria happily complies.

The next day, Maria wakes up with a smile, remembering what happened the night before and already making plans for breakfast. With her eyes still closed, she moves around on her bed searching for a certain spy, but to her disappointment she can’t find her. Maria gets up and searches the house, but the only thing she finds is a note:

Maria,  
I’m sorry about running away in the middle of the night, but I can’t do this again. I know I was the one who came running in, and I apologize because deep down I knew that I could never go back to what we were before and yet I let my emotions have the best of me, but this won’t happen again.

As you probably know I have quite a few things to explain to Congress about the leaked information, and by now so many people want me dead I believe I’ll have to lay low for awhile. Please don’t contact me. I need your help to be able to forget this.

Maria was stunned. Just when she thought there was a silver lining to everything that was happening the letter got her dumbfounded. All she wanted to do was call Nat and try to reason with her while she could still reach her, but she had no right to do that. The redhead made her intentions very clear and was adamant that Maria wasn’t a part of any foreseeable plans.

Maria spends the next week in a vortex of crying, drinking, eating junk food and crying some more whenever she saw Natasha on TV, which that week in particular was not at all rare. This whole experience was surreal to her. She was not one prone to pinning and most of the time she barely even cared if the person she was going out with dumped her or not, but oh was she paying for all that insensitivity. Things were so simple before, but at the same time they weren’t. The more Maria thought about it the easier it was to see the signs telling her Natasha was different. Signs that if she didn’t completely ignored before she could have Nat by her side now, and remembering all this was driving the commander insane. She was aware that nothing really good could come out of torturing herself with what she could or should have done, but she could not escape it. She came to the conclusion that if this was love, love sucked, but at the same time it didn’t? Because she didn’t remember ever being as happy as she was when Natasha came to her place that night, and how the sex that was great before somehow became otherworldly. She was officially a rom-com cliché.

To cope with all these feelings, she decided to bury herself in her work, only to remember she didn’t have one anymore, so she applies to Stark Industries. This was the plan she agreed with Fury before, because working with Stark would mean that she would always be close to the Avengers Initiative and right now Maria was thrilled about going as far away from Washington as she could, because knowing Natasha was here was sometimes too tempting.

In New York, she passes all SI tests with ease. After SHIELD, a lie detector was a child’s play. Her job title was somehow of a mystery even to her, but what mattered was she was more or less the second in command when it came to SI Defense and the Avengers Initiative. It was not easy working side by side with Tony, but she managed. Dealing with difficult people and men with a huge sense of self was a requirement in her previous job.

Furthermore, considering how Maria was buried in bureaucracy and every possible agency wanted to question her, she could make use of all the protection and guarantees that only the best lawyers were able to provide. She still needed to go to D.C. on a regular basis, since the Congress considered questioning her about SHIELD’s activities almost a hobby - Maria couldn’t fathom how such morons were elected, on their best days they couldn’t even understand the most basic SHIELD strategies if their lives depended on it. But perhaps the best benefit of working for Stark Industries was becoming friends with Pepper.

The blonde became such a close friend and the thought of it was so comforting to Maria she couldn’t help but look back and wonder why she was so close off to everyone. So she does her best to lighten up a bit, outside work hours of course, and it pays off, getting her closer to Steve and Clint and a few other coworkers. Maria even helps Coulson and his team with that Grant Ward asshole, who in her opinion was one of those assholes other assholes look at and say ‘wow, not there’s an asshole’ which taking into account how many assholes Maria knew, this was a whole new level.

A few months later the Avengers are reassembled, even Thor comes back to assist, which meant Natasha was also back. Maria did her best to avoid her, moreover because apparently Natasha and Banner had gotten a lot closer while she was away. It was a slow building romance and Maria didn’t have the stomach to watch they dance around each other like birds, so her communications with Natasha summed up to a few hellos and strictly professional affairs.

On a Wednesday afternoon, Maria is once again trying her best not stare at the redhead and Banner flirting in his lab (why every damn wall on this building was made of glass?). Pepper sees it and because she knew of all the drama between Maria and the spy she intervenes.

“When are you going to do something about it? And don’t play dumb, you know what I’m talking about”

“I am doing something about it.”

“Nope. Mopping does not qualify.”

“I’m serious, Pepper.”

“Ok then, enlighten me.”

“I decided not to interfere. I am simply respecting her wishes.”

“So, your feelings for her are gone?”

“No. I know I absolutely love her and because of that I want her to be happy. And maybe Banner is the one who could provide her that.”

“You do realize that what you just said is the complete opposite of doing something, right?”

You laugh.

“Maria, if you don’t act you will regret it. And I know you worked hard on convincing yourself that everything you just said is the right thing to do, but guess what?”

“It isn’t?”

“No, that’s not the point. The point is you are doing everything you regretted doing again. You are quite frankly cowardly seeking a one side resolution to soothe your own fears and once again you are leaving Nat out of the equation. You need to understand that you are not the one who gets to decide what’s better and what’s not for her, that decision belongs to her and to her only. Taking the so called ‘high road’ and giving up is actually depriving her of her choice, being that choice you or not.”

“Wow. A bit early for a wake up call for my taste. But that’s not it. She made her call, I’m just complying”

“No, you are shielding yourself behind a letter she left months ago, at a time she most certainly wasn’t on her right mind because of everything that happened to SHIELD. I get it, it is easier to conform to this outcome than trying and possibly getting your heart broken again.”

“Seems like a pretty reasonable motive to continue to keep away.”

Pepper smiles. “I’m serious, Maria. Long term speaking, a no is definitely better than a ‘what if’... and I know you already created hundreds of scenarios with Romanoff in your head. I did it too ”

“I didn’t know you were into women…”

“Don’t be silly, I’m talking about Tony. Before either of us acted on it I convinced myself it would never happen or work. But deep down I was imagining situations where it could work out. Crazy right?”

“Even more crazy is how you deal with him. It is quite impressive.”

“What can I say, I love him. And don’t change the subject.”

Steve comes in and interrupts, saying that they had the location of Loki’s scepter and the Avengers go to the rescue. The mission is a success, and Tony throws a party to celebrate.

At the party Maria decides to try to talk to Nat, but Banner wouldn’t leave her side. She distracts herself with other people, until she sees Nat back at the bar, this time unaccompanied. Maria approaches her, but it was Natasha who initiated conversation.

“What can I get you, blue eyes?”

Maria knew better than to think this light flirting meant anything. Over the years she learned how the spy operated, and she could see the other woman had all her walls up, much different than how she acted around Banner.

“Whisky is fine”

“Coming right up.”

Natasha serves them both a generous dose of the best whisky she could find. “Cheers!”

“Cheers.”

They raise their glasses and Natasha finishes her drink in one big gulp. 

“Finally some closure, huh?

“Closure?” Natasha seemed confused.

“With the scepter”

“Ah! Yes, it’s great news.” There is a small and awkward silence. “You should wear red more often, it suits you.”

“Thanks.”

“And Janice from supplies can’t seem to take her eyes off of you.” She arches an eyebrow to where Janice was sitting.

“Once a spy always a spy, huh?”

“I beg your pardon?”

“Keeping track of everything happening in the room. Classic spy move.”

“Old habits die hard I guess.” She looks at Maria. “For instance, I’m willing to bet you have a gun on you.”

“I most definitely have, yes. You, know, precaution.”

“Sure.”

“Yours is behind the counter isn’t it?”

“As you said, precaution.”

Another small awkward silence.

“I was thinking, it’s been awhile since we talked. Wanna go out someday to catch up?”

“Sure, sounds fun.”

“I’ll call you”

Natasha nods and Maria leaves, not wanting to risk saying anything stupid, and somewhat impressed with how relatively easy things went.

After the party, the Avengers and a few select friends, including Maria, are chatting and trying to lift Thor’s hammer. Natasha is once again talking to Banner, but it doesn’t last long, because Ultron surfaces and hell breaks loose.

When the brunette learns who Ultron was and who created him, she comes to the conclusion she would never understand Tony Stark. How it was possible to be so incredibly intelligent but at the same time so stupid? It would be delightfully paradoxical if it wasn’t so absurdly dangerous.

During their efforts to stop/kill Ultron, Maria only learned Natasha had been kidnapped after it happened. Luckily Fury enlisted her to take action and once again command the Helicarrier as well as all communications between and with the Avengers and the crew.

Although Maria was happy to go back to her roots, she was not prepared to what came next, when Banner found Nat. She knew the two of them were closer than usual and they look they shared usually conveyed affection, but she was not ready to hear Natasha say she adored him. In that moment all hopes she harbored were smashed. A big, Hulk-sized smash. She had officially lost. Because of everything that was happening she had no time to process it, thankfully, so she just focused on coordinating others and try to save the world. 

When it was over, Maria saw Natasha trying to contact Banner and being ignored, so she put every available employee she had trying to find him. She wanted Nat to be happy, no matter how bittersweet it would taste, but her efforts lead to very little since Stark’s stealth technology was almost untraceable.

When Pepper learns about what happened she tries to console Maria, often highlighting other women she could invest on, but the commander is not ready to give this relationship another try, so despite Pepper’s insistence, she stays at the tower on a beautiful Friday night, reading.

Upon noticing she didn’t have more coffee or coffee beans, she goes to the cafeteria to get a fix. To her surprise, Natasha is there making popcorn.

“Hey.”

“Hey.”

“Coffee this late at night?”

“You are the one to say. You basically live on it.”

“True.” She takes the bag out of the microwave. “Popcorn?”

“I’m ok, thanks. What are you up to?”

“Movie. Interested?”

“Sure, why not.”

It seemed like and inoffensive invitation, and knowing about Natasha’s predilections towards cartoons she was sure the movie would be Wall-E or Finding Nemo, and she just enjoyed spending time next to the spy. Regardless of the heartbreak, Natasha was good company, so she decided to test the waters and see how she felt . She was not prepared to watch Casablanca.

As they sit, Natasha begins to talk.

“Maria, I wanted to thank you.”

“What for?”

“I know everything you did to try to find Bruce.”

“Don’t mention it.”

They exchange smiles.

“Good thing is I’m starting to getting used to being left by my potential romantic endeavours.”

“I never left you.”

“Yeah, because you weren’t even there in the first place.” Natasha says, without missing a beat. As soon as the words come out Maria can see that Natasha regrets them. “I’m sorry, that was completely out of line. Should we just stop talking and watch the movie?”

Maria could correct her and say that she was the one who disappeared in the middle of the night and not the other way around but opts not to. Arguing about the past would do nothing to improve the future. “Nat, I can go if you want me to.”

“No, no. Please, stay.”

Maria can see the sincerity in the spy’s eyes, so she stays. They shared the popcorn and talked very little during the movie, that is until the scene at the deserted café.

“Do you think that’s possible?” Natasha asks.

“What?”

“Loving two people at the same time?”

Maria takes a moment to consider it. It seemed chaotic and bound to end in tears, but not impossible. “I suppose it is.” She pauses. “But I also think you would love one of them more, even if just a little bit.”

“Yeah, you are right on this one.”

“Speaking from experience?”

“I guess you could say so. The worst part is, I can’t tell who’s the one more at fault. Him, for leaving me or I, for loving someone else more.”

“It can never be easy, can it?”

“I guess not, and it does make me wonder about polyamorous people though. I’m unable to make things work out with one, I can’t even imagine what it would be like with multiple. I guess they are more enlightened than me.”

Maria laughs and they keep on watching the movie. When it's over they go to their respective apartments.

Only after showering, putting her PJs, brushing her teeth and finding a comfortable position to sleep in that the possibility that Natasha was talking about her with the whole loving two people at the same time thing occurred to her. Obviously this was only a possibility, but after so much time hiding her feelings Maria decides to take a shot and immediately calls Pepper for help. She had a plan and she needed to make sure it was perfect.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thanks for reading and I'd love to know your opinion on this!


End file.
